Slip Away

Black Bell;
2014

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The sound and aesthetic Total Slacker developed on Thrashin’ was unsustainable. They made a series of bold, primary colored choices on that album, and had they gone down a similar path for a second LP, it would've been a complete slog. Only a few songs on Thrashin' transcended the “cartoon slacker” mire. It was an album that heavily referenced the 1990s, and not simply because of their guitar sound. They had lyrics about “Full House” and Crystal Pepsi. They slapped a Jurassic Park logo on the cover. One of their more contemporary subjects was a song about going on a “MySpace date”. Everything about it felt like a caricature built from memories steeped in Pogs, slap bracelets, and TGIF reruns.

Thankfully, the band largely stepped away from the caricature they created for themselves and adopted a new aesthetic for Slip Away. But they haven’t left the 1990s at all: They’ve launched themselves wholeheartedly into shoegaze territory. Largely gone are the defined guitar textures of their previous LP. Now, a plucked string rings for a bit longer, and when the entire band kicks in for full force, it’s one big gauzy mass of sound.

But if you take a moment to recall a successful record in the shoegaze canon, Slip Away crumbles quickly. Despite being only 37 minutes, it feels twice as long. Everything spins in place ad nauseam without much sense of movement. Sure, there's some passion here, but it's hard to take seriously when it's about fighting the babysitter's boyfriend (on a track called "Fight the Babysitter's Boyfriend"). Singing from the perspective of a little kid, he delivers cringe-worthy things like, "I know you've got a mustache/ But you've been treating my babysitter real bad". Nothing about the song is particularly funny (except the noodly guitar solo toward the end), so it's hard to say whether or not the band's attempting satire. Further muddling things is a sincere-sounding rallying cry for high self-esteem that clearly doubles as an extended masturbation reference ("Touch Yrself").

"Super Big Gulp" and "Thighmaster" both coast on nostalgic references. There's nothing substantial in the way of narrative, humor, or insight, and sonically, the songs stay the monotonous course. Then there's "Who Killed Kennedy", which opens with a chug and launches into a series of conspiracy theories regarding JFK's assassination. At one point, Tucker Rountree goes full Drunk Uncle, singing, "I think Facebook travelled back in time,/ think about it, who could have organized the crime."

It's not all bad. "See Right Through" has a strong central guitar and bass line, and the melody and lyrics are perfectly suited to Rountree's nasal vocals. "Keep the Ships at Bay" has muscle and drive, which largely makes up for how repetitive it is. They show the most promise on "Out of Body Experience", where they pick up the pace and turn up the power to deliver an exciting central hook. The song never gets stale or overstays its welcome—it's a legitimately captivating track with a melody that works well with Rountree's voice. His harmony at the chorus with Emily Oppenheimer is nice and somewhat restrained—a good look for this band. It's a welcome indication that they're capable of so much better than what they offer on Slip Away. They get bogged down by lame references, alluding to popular culture, glorifying Big Gulps as an American icon, and dare I say it, being the band that smokes weed at the Olive Garden. Somewhere behind all that stuff, there's still potential.